Vi Propsal

Proposal
To design and put in place voluntary phonics-based reading programs
in Virgin Islands public schools

Should we design and put in place voluntary phonics-based reading programs in our Virgin Islands public schools? The Phonics Institute says yes. Many of our children do not read and write well. We all know that. But our children do not have to be bad readers. Many of our children read poorly because they stumble and hack their way through their reading. Yet to get ahead, they have to learn how to look at the page, and clearly and with confidence “speak the written word” - and that means every word, with precision. Written words are made up of letters that stand for the sounds of our speech. If the children learn the rules for encoding our speech sounds into letters and decoding the letters into sounds, they will be able to “speak the written word.” If our children can speak the written word, they will become good readers and they can live their dreams. If they cannot speak the written word easily and with confidence, they will be put down as nonachievers. They will likely stay down and under, slaves of their inability to read well. Mastery of the written word is the way to get ahead. A good reading program picks our children up; the bad one strikes them down. Why not step out of the ghetto and into the light?

The Phonics Institute says “Let’s break the shackles of ignorance that keep our children down. Let’s give them the tools they need to pull themselves up. Let’s teach them the rules they need to know to break the code of writing. Let’s move up from slavery to mastery.”

These rules - the letter code for writing - are called the rules of phonics. Let’s design and put in place voluntary phonics-based reading programs in our Virgin Islands public schools. The Phonics Institute could find unused funds or get new outside funding to put in place voluntary phonics-based reading programs in our schools. The Phonics Institute could help in a variety of ways: from establishing a “virtual” resource room; to voluntary, practical professional development for teachers; to help in developing and implementing the Virgin Islands Language Compendium described in this proposal; to a voluntary cadre of schools forming a phonics forum - a community within the community of Virgin Islands public schools. The work of The Phonics Institute can be squeezed or stretched to address the interests and fulfill the needs of the Virgin Islands public schools.

Before looking more closely at the meat of what The Phonics Institute proposes to do, let’s look at the elements of reading with understanding. This is what we want our children to do: read with understanding (and write well, too). What knowledge does the understanding reader have? What are his (or her) skills? What are his habits? Reading with understanding is composed, we might say, of five elements:

These are the elements of reading with understanding. How do they work together? The elements form a hierarchy. Why? Because vocabulary, grammar, clear thinking, and orientation all stand on the other element - the ability to speak the written word. If you can’t talk out loud the words on the page, your vocabulary, grammar, clear thinking, and orientation do not a reader make. A good vocabulary, an understanding of standard English grammar, the ability to think clearly, and a healthy orientation in life will all help a reader to catch the meaning of what he reads, but they all hang on the ability to carry the written words on the page into speech. If you can do that and build up your vocabulary, learn the grammar, think clearly, and have your feet on the ground; you can read anything with confidence.

Later in this proposal - in the section “Justification for Proposal” - it is explained why phonics-based reading instruction is the best way to develop the ability to speak the written word. This proposal does not ignore the other four elements of reading with understanding: vocabulary, grammar, clear thinking, and orientation.

The word “vocabulary” here means, first, word knowledge. If a child comes upon the word “indecision” in his reading, he has to be able to say it aloud, but he also needs to know what it means. Vocabulary-building is important. The Phonics Institute favors direct, explicit, extensive vocabulary-building. Yet, “having a good vocabulary” means more than just learning the definitions of many words. It also means learning the facts that make up our shared cultural heritage, now called cultural literacy.

We must aim to develop good grammar too. Out in the street, many use nonstandard word order, plurals and possessives, and forms of verbs and pronouns. But our schools should concentrate on making sure we learn the standard “proper” use of verbs, plurals, possessives, pronouns, and word order we must know if we are to master reading, writing, and speaking standard English. The Phonics Institute recommends direct, explicit, extensive instruction in standard English grammar as well.

And clear thinking: it is worth it to teach the students how thought works, from the formal concepts of deductive and inductive logic; through the probing and testing of “twenty questions;” through the self-awareness of our resonating with an author we love, who “tells it like it is.” Sharpening thinking skills can be an important part of this proposal.

Orientation is also critically important to reading with understanding. Here, your orientation means your basic attitude towards life and your place in it. If a person is the type of atheist or agnostic who believes morals are artificial rules to keep the masses under control; and maximizing receipt of money and sensual pleasure is the name of the game, his appreciation for everything he reads will be influenced by his orientation. If, on the other hand, a person is a dedicated Christian who believes we should each pick up our cross everyday, resist our sinful tendencies, and work to do God’s will, everything he reads will be affected by this orientation. The effects of our orientation on our understanding of what we read, are profound. Orientation is not just a matter of clear thinking; there is more to it than that.

Now to the proposal. The proposal can be fully implemented, or implemented in parts. The Phonics Institute could:

Apply for and obtain funding for the services of The Phonics Institute. Other activities of The Phonics Institute listed below could depend upon this funding.

Survey reading instruction practices within the Virgin Islands public schools, with particular focus on the teaching of “word recognition techniques,” vocabulary development, and grammar.

Survey (and “pitch” to) administrators and teachers to identify likely candidate classrooms and schools for the institution of voluntary phonics-based reading instruction programs. Principal, but by no means exclusive, focus is likely to be on elementary schools, and especially primary grades. Remedial reading classes in junior high and high school are also likely candidates.

Survey available tests for measuring: (1) phonemic awareness; (2) knowledge of phonics rules; and (3) familiarity with teaching techniques for teaching in a phonics-based classroom (the “teacher tests”). Obtain and develop valid and reliable teacher tests.

Administer teacher tests to teachers and possibly administrators in candidate classrooms and schools.

Obtain or develop a method for the teaching of phonics and phonics-teaching techniques to candidate teachers and possibly administrators.

Provide/arrange for the providing of needed professional development/in-service training for candidate teachers and possibly administrators.

Survey available phonics-based reading curricula, commercially available and home-grown. Develop The Phonics Institute method for teaching reading. Present the results of the survey and development to the candidate teachers and administrators for selection for use in their classrooms.

Assist in the selection of phonics-based reading curricula to be pilot-tested in a voluntary program.

Supervise/assist in the supervising of the implementation of the selected phonics-based reading curricula in a voluntary pilot-testing program.

Survey available instruments for the measurement and evaluation of the effectiveness of the phonics-based reading curricula involved in the pilot-testing program. Develop measurement and evaluation instruments as needed.

Assist in the selection and implementation of a program for the evaluation and assessment of the phonics-based reading curricula in the pilot-testing program.

Consult with and report to the Governor of the Virgin Islands, the Virgin Islands Department of Education, and the Virgin Islands Board of Education regarding all aspects of the program detailed herein. Report to all three on the surveys, the needs assessments, the implementation, the evaluation, and the assessment of the pilot-testing program.

Assist in the expansion of the pilot-testing program should it prove warranted and desired by the Virgin Islands.

Train and arrange for the training of teachers and administrators who are participants in the phonics-based reading curricula pilot program.

Assist teachers and administrators as necessary during the implementation of the phonics-based reading curricula.

Assist in the development of a system-wide teacher assistance program to assist teachers in sharpening their phonemic awareness, their knowledge of phonics rules, and their practical ability to teach phonics-based reading and writing.

Survey available vocabulary-building programs for phonics-based reading classrooms and assist in the development of a vocabulary-building program for the Virgin Islands public schools.

Survey available direct, explicit grammar programs for phonics-based reading classrooms and assist in the development of a direct instruction grammar program for the Virgin Islands public schools.

Survey available programs for direct instruction in formal and informal logic and skills fostering clarity of thought and assist in the development of a direct instruction program for teaching logic and clear thinking in the Virgin Islands public schools.

Assist in the development of a program to assist in orienting students in the Virgin Islands public schools.

Survey available informal reading inventories and assist in the implementation of the use of informal reading inventories assessing students’ phonics-based reading ability.

Assist in the development of the Virgin Islands Language Compendium, a practical handbook for the professional development/in-service training of Virgin Islands public schools teachers to familiarize them with special Virgin Islands speech and its use in the Virgin Islands public schools reading curriculum.

Twenty-four years ago J.L. Dillard argued that when we teach African-American children to read, the instruction should explicitly recognize and deal with the non-standard syntax, verb forms, pronouns, possessives, informal contractions, and the like, many of them exhibit in their speech. Oakland (California) Unified School District has taken the step of deciding to follow Dr. Dillard’s advice. If handled well, Ebonics in the classroom could help. But African-American students are not the only ones doing poorly in reading and writing in the United States. Poor reading and writing in modern-day American classrooms spans across the races and socio-economic levels. The Phonics Institute contends the principal reason for this is that children are encouraged to develop bad reading habits, which result in poor readers. The solution is to capitalize on the alphabetic nature of written English - using a phonics-based approach, which encourages students to habitually figure out all written words based upon the “sound values” of the letters on the page.

Let’s put aside for a moment the special problems in learning to read encountered by African American - or, more specifically, Crucian - students caused by their use of “non-standard” English at home and in the street. Let’s look at the general problem of poor reading instruction and the solution. Unlike the Chinese, we are fortunate that our written language is composed of symbols (letters) that stand, either singly or in combination, for one or another of the forty-four (or thereabout) sounds of our spoken language. Focusing on learning the “sound values” of the letters on the page - based on the alphabetic nature of written English - and constant, habitual use of this information, is the key to skillful reading (and writing).

But strongly disciplined, focused reading instruction concentrating on letter sound values is out of favor in the United States today. The prevailing theory is that we should not be so concerned about how children read. Instead, the theory goes, children will become “lifelong readers” if they early on develop an interest in reading. They say the way to do this is to focus on developing this “love for reading” by making early reading lessons “fun,” “relevant,” “natural,” and “meaningful,” instead of focusing on the mechanics of reading. Out of misguided “respect” for the child, any old way of “approaching print” is regarded as a legitimate “reading strategy.” Instead of teaching the children directly, intensively, and systematically the “sound values” of the letters on the page, and insisting they use this information to figure out accurately every word, the children are told it is perfectly o.k. to memorize all kinds of words without understanding the letter sound values and to guess at words they encounter in their reading. This leads to very, very bad habits of guessing and hacking through reading. These poor reading habits were encouraged in the California It’s Elementary! “critical thinking” curriculum. It was an absolute disaster, with only 18% of the fourth-graders scoring at the proficient or advanced level on the 1994 Naep reading exam (and 56% of California fourth-graders at the “below-basic” level in their reading). California was tied at second-to-last with Mississippi. Only Louisiana scored lower, at a 15% proficient. (Eleven states did not administer the test.) California was so bad that the legislature stepped in; the mandatory whole language curriculum was thrown out; and the legislature mandated direct phonics instruction in the schools. Whole language disasters are spread across the United States. Ironically, this year, the Virgin Islands commenced its use of a whole language reading curriculum.

In most of our schools, the rules explaining how our oral language is encoded in writing - the rules of phonics - are wrongly regarded as less important than rote memorization and guessing. If our Virgin Islands schools were to jump off this bandwagon, and into intensive phonics (at least in some schools or some classrooms) - combined with explicit teaching of “proper” grammar - which may be compared with local “nonstandard” grammar using a Virgin Islands Language Compendium which gathers together examples of typical “nonstandard” Virgin Islands speech - to get down syntax, verb forms, pronouns, possessives, word endings - and extensive explicit vocabulary building - what an exciting prospect we would have!

Of course, initially children do not know the "sound values" of English letters and letter combinations - or how letter sounds may vary from situation to situation - this phonics information must be learned. At first, children have a natural tendency to guess at words since they do not have sufficient phonics information to figure out the sound values of all the letters and letter blends. In a phonics-based (phonics-first) classroom, the teacher gives the children right from the start the heavy presentation of phonics information they need to wean themselves away from guessing, relying instead upon phonics information to sound out and figure out words on their own.

In a phonics-first program, the children may start out learning the basic sounds and the names of all the letters, and move on to easily pronounceable short syllables and words, gradually encountering changes in the "sound values" of letters, and other syllables and words the children are equipped (because of explicit phonics instruction) to analyze and sound out. If children are consistently taught to do this - and if they understand “standard” English syntax, verb forms, and so on - they become strong, confident readers.

But usually in the United States today, the child's initial tendency to guess at unfamiliar words is treated as a perfectly fine "reading strategy." Children are explicitly taught that they need not be precise in reading. Instead, they may be encouraged, when encountering a word not yet memorized, to come up with a guess at what the word is, by using just a little bit of phonics information - the first letter or the first letter blend (such as sh or ch) - together with visual cues the children may not relate at all to the "sound values" of the letters on the page - such as a word ending they already know; little words they already have memorized in the middle of a longer word; the shape of the word (that's right, the shape); and the context, including pictures. These guessing techniques frequently result in wrong guesses. They also make children think they need not pay close attention to the letters on the page. As a result, many children become chronic guessers and incompetent readers who lack confidence (and for good reason).

This leaves us with the national, and local, tragedy of the horrible failure of our schools. We have a proliferation of remedial reading instructors, illiterates, semiliterates, and under-achievers; and children bored with, and dropping out of school. Reading as a guessing game can be confusing and annoying. Reading based on a solid foundation of phonics can be an enjoyable detective game which builds confidence and competence.

One must be wary in discussions of this topic, for everyone claims phonics is an important element of his or her program. There is all the difference in the world, however, between a phonics-based program and one which incorporates phonics as “one element in a multi-faceted program.” Now the typical whole language classroom teacher might stand up and say: “Hold it! We do teach phonics!” Although Rudolph Flesch’s great 1995 book, Why Johnny Can’t Read, was addressed principally to mothers and fathers, the last chapter is “A Letter to Johnny’s Teacher.” Here, Dr. Flesch writes directly to the typical teacher of 1955 America. In the letter to Johnny’s teacher Dr. Flesch points out that Teacher Smith’s principal Mr. Robinson, claimed “Oh, but we do give them phonics... .” Dr. Flesch states “His conscience was clear. In his school, he explained to me proudly, they use the best features of all methods. There is a lot to be said for phonics, and of course phonics is used too.” (p. 120) (Emphasis in original.)

Here is how Dr. Flesch addresses Ms Smith, responding to this claim by Mr. Robinson:

The trouble with this is that we are not talking about the same thing: the phonics the mothers and I are talking about is not the same phonics that you and Mr. Robinson mean. We mean phonics as a way to learn reading. We mean phonics that is taught to the child letter by letter and sound by sound until he knows it - and when he knows it he knows how to read. We mean phonics as a complete, systematic subject - the sum total of information about the phonetic rules by which English is spelled. We mean phonics as it was taught in this country until some thirty years ago, and as it is taught all over the world today. There is no room for misunderstanding, is there? We say, and we cannot be budged, that when you learn phonics, in our sense of the word, you learn how to read. We want our children taught this particular set of facts and rules, because we know that this and only this will do the job.

But when you and Mr. Robinson talk about phonics, you mean something entirely different. You mean phonics as one among a dozen things that come into the teaching of reading. You mean that on a Wednesday in May, out of the blue and with nothing before and after it, you go to the blackboard and show the children that the word pin with an e at the end makes pine. The children thereupon dutifully “learn” that fact. They are not shown that the same principle holds for a,e,o, and u; they are not shown that it also applies to pining and tiny; they are not told what short and long vowels there are; they are not told that i also makes the sound of ir in bird and the sound of ie in pie. No. They are given “incidental,” “intrinsic” phonics. On a Friday in June they will be told that tch in catch stands for the sound of ch. Next year in October they may hear about nk as in pink.

Let’s understand each other. Systematic phonics is one thing, unsystematic phonics is another. Systematic phonics is the way to teach reading, unsystematic phonics is nothing - an occasional excursion into something that has nothing whatever to do with the method used to fix words in the child’s mind. Either you tell a child that the word is trip because the letter sounds add up to “trip” and nothing else - or you tell him, “Don’t you remember, we had the word last week, in the story about the trip to the woods.” Phonics is not “one of many techniques the child can use to unlock the meaning of words” (you can’t possibly imagine how sick I am of all this jargon) - phonics is simply the knowledge of the way spoken English is put on paper.

Among other things, this means that there is an end to phonics. Phonics is something that a child can master completely, once and for all, with the assurance that he has covered everything there is. This is of tremendous emotional significance to the child - and to an adult too, for that matter. Reading, he sees, is something that can be learned from A to Z - or let’s rather say, from the sound of a in apple to the sound of zh in vision. There are a known number of items to be mastered and when he is through he knows how to read. You are a teacher, Miss Smith. You must know what it means to anyone learning a given subject when there is an end to the book, when he knows that at the bottom of page 128 he will be through. So and so many pages covered, so and so many still to go. There is a concrete goal. Talk about motivation - what better motivation could there conceivably be than the knowledge that at the end of page 128 he will have learned how to read?

The "multi-faceted" program encourages children to develop the habit of memorizing words without understanding the letter sound values, and the habit of guessing at words while reading. These bad habits, once begun, are difficult to break. How sad to have not only first and second graders who are guessing at unfamiliar words they encounter in print; we also have fifth, seventh, and even eleventh and twelfth graders who use guessing as a "reading strategy." It is far better to get the children on the right track right from the start, so they realize there is information available to them - about the sounds of letters and letter combinations - that will enable them to approach their reading not as uncertain guessers, but rather as readers who have the power to figure out with precision what each word is; thus developing a mastery of reading and writing, instead of being slaves of their own inability to read well.

Each individual student has his or her own peculiarities, his or her own strengths and weaknesses. Should reading teaching methodology be adapted to the characteristics of the individual student? If some children tend to be more auditory than visual learners, some more visual than auditory, and some more tactile-kinesthetic than either visual or auditory, does this mean some of these children should be taught to memorize words without understanding the sound values of letters, and to guess at words using incomplete and inadequate visual cues? Does this mean some children should not be taught with phonics-based reading instruction?

To answer this question, let us turn to Marilyn Jager Adams, the author of Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning About Print (MIT Press, 1990). Dr. Adams writes:

In particular, it was reasoned, not all children are alike. Some are global perceivers by nature, and some analytic; some are auditorily attuned, and some are visual. Maybe phoneme awareness and letter-name facility are the best predictors for the auditory, analytic students. And maybe those students are even in the majority.

But what about the other students? With global, visual predispositions, wouldn't they be better off with a sight word approach to reading? Wouldn't they be fettered, even frustrated and discouraged, with a phonic approach? More generally, wouldn't it be wise to tailor instructional process and materials to children's perceptual styles or dominant modalities?

So appealing is this argument that it has been broadly advocated and adopted. In a study of special education teachers in Illinois, Arter and Jenkins found that 95 percent were familiar with the argument. Of those familiar with it, 99 percent believed that modality considerations should be a primary consideration in devising instruction for children with learning difficulties.

Arter and Jenkins also found that 95 percent of their special education teachers believed that the modality argument was supported by research. Unhappily it is not. Although many empirical studies have been conducted on this issue, the hypothetical interaction between program effectiveness and preferred modalities is not supported by the data.

There has also been a tremendous amount of research on whether reading acquisition can be accelerated by training various nonlinguistic perceptual and motor skills such as spatial relations, visual memory, visual discrimination, visual-motor integration, gross and fine motor coordination, tactile-kinesthetic activities, auditory discrimination, and auditory-visual integration. Despite the energy invested in such endeavors and despite the fact that many of the activities may be good for children in any number of ways, they seem not to produce any measurable payoff in learning to read. Beginning to Read, pp.60-61; citations omitted.

Labeling our children by putting them into little boxes marked ‘auditory learner” or “visual learner” or the like is an educationally dubious practice. Steven A. Stahl, Jean Osborn, and Marcy Stein, in “Research does not Support Marching Instruction to Learning Styles” appearing on page 32 of the December 1995/January 1996 issue of Reading TODAY tell of a “classical study” published in 1972 in Reading Research Quarterly by Helen Robinson. Ms Robinson found that only 50 out of 448 first-graders “could be reliably classified as either ‘visual’ or ‘auditory’ learners.” Ms Robinson “was unable to find any connection between how they were taught and how they learned.” Stahl and his co-authors also cite a 1977 analysis by Arter and Jenkins which found that the studies they examined discredited the modality-teaching model by a ratio of 14 to 1. Since then, Stahl and his co-authors report, “more than three dozen published studies have failed to find that different children respond differently to different teaching methods because of their modality preference.”

It matters not whether an educational diagnostician would classify Johnny as an "auditory learner," a "visual learner," an "analytical thinker," a "global perceiver," or some such categorization. All children should be taught how our spoken language is encoded in writing, and how to decode the written word. This information should be used by all students constantly in learning to read and write. Although this learning process never really ceases, students can "get the hang of it," in a well-planned and executed program early on in school so that their ability to read well will never be shaken. It is something like learning how to ride a bicycle: once you learn how to read, absent organic brain injury, it will never be forgotten. The way reading is taught now, however, does not ingrain constant use of the information and techniques of phonics to the figuring out of all words with ease. As a result, we have the tragic absurdity of youngsters forgetting "how to read." The real problem, of course, is that the youngsters never really learned how to read; that is, how to figure out every written word. Instead the youngster who has forgotten how to read has forgotten words memorized as wholes without necessarily understanding the sound values of the letters in the words, and has not developed the habit of using phonics information to figure out the rest of the words.

Phonics should not become the whole reading and writing program; rather phonics should be the all-pervading basis for a good reading program. Children should also be taught vocabulary, style, semantics, and syntax. That is where grammar and vocabulary instruction come in.

Absent an extraordinary gift from God - typically manifested in some form of brilliance - all of us must discipline ourselves to “empower” ourselves. We want to pat every child on the back, and frequently, with words of encouragement and recognition of the child's goodness and abilities, but we do not want to spend all of our time patting all the children on their backs. We want to spend a good portion of the time assisting the children to develop good habits - not just good reading habits - but all kinds of good habits, including the virtues. This requires us to be loving task-masters, constantly and consistently encouraging discipline in our children. The guessing-based reading instruction taught in our schools encourages sloppy, imprecise reading leading to low test scores and a life crippled by poor reading ability. Our children need to be encouraged instead to develop the habit of disciplined reading, where they figure out all words with precision and confidence. They can do this - that is, they have the native ability to do this - but, many of them don't, because their teachers tell them it is o.k. to use undisciplined guessing instead.

The focus of these phonics recommendations is not to “weed out” supposedly unfit (Shall we say “phonics-challenged”?) teachers. The focus is to end up with all of the teachers and administrators in the pilot program understanding phonics and using it to teach the students to read well.

The Phonics Institute is a trade name of its director, Edward Haskins Jacobs. Mr. Jacobs was born in Chicago in 1951. He was graduated in 1972 from the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, with an A.B., cum laude, in physics. In college he studied special topics in education and educational psychology, as well as an introduction to psychology and social psychology. He was graduated from The Law School of the University of Chicago in 1975 and has actively practiced law for over twenty years as a bond counsel, prosecutor, general practitioner, construction and labor lawyer, and trial lawyer. In 1990, his elder child switched from a phonics-based Montessori program to a whole language program and started guessing as a “reading strategy.” After a couple of years, he figured out what was going on and began a study of reading instruction. He began The Phonics Institute in 1992. For a few years he was a trustee of St. Joseph High School, and at one time he headed the board of trustees of Camp Arawak, a skills training program for at-risk youth. He is obtaining a masters degree in education at the University of the Virgin Islands and has completed graduate courses in basic research, tests and measurements, organization and governance of American education, supervision of instruction and staff, curriculum development, and a seminar on issues in educational administration. He is licensed by the Virgin Islands as an attorney and as an educational consultant.

Adams, M.J. (1990). Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning About Print. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Dillard, J.L. (1973). Black English: Its History and Usage in the United States. New York: Vintage Books.

Flesch, R. (1955). Why Johnny Can't Read - And What You Can Do About It. New York: HarperCollins.

Stahl, S.A., Osborn, J. & Stein, M. (December 1995/January 1996). Research does not support matching instruction to learning styles. Reading TODAY, p. 32.